It has been almost exactly four years since McCloud third-grade teacher Kimberly Ann Crain was accused of photographing her students as they changed intounderwear at a holiday party at her home. During the investigation, it was discovered that Crain not only took explicit photos and videos of younggirls, but also sent them to Gary Doby, a retired early childhood development professor who had been Crain's teacher at Oklahoma Baptist University.Additionally, Crain would have girls Skype with "Uncle G" at school during class time.
Crain ultimately pleaded guilty to multiple counts of child sexual exploitation and child pornography. In return for her plea, she was sentenced to 45years in prison--the equivalent of a life sentence under Oklahoma law.
Doby was considered to be the instigator of the acts, and was said to have manipulated Crain into sending him the sexually explicit images of her students.He was given multiple life sentences for 18 counts of sexual exploitation of a child under 12 and other related charges. All sentences were to runconcurrently.
Nearly a year after he was sentenced, Doby filed a petition for judicial review and sentence modification. The state district court denied his request,and he then filed an application for post-conviction relief. This was likewise denied by the state district court and the denial was affirmedby the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals.
Doby then sought federal relief, alleging that his attorney �failed to inform [him] of the elements of the offense and then, without reason, notice orconsultation, completely abandoned [him] during the 10-day window for initiating a direct appeal.� He further alleged that his trial attorney did notinform him of the elements of his sexual-exploitation and lewd-molestation offenses until �well after sentencing, when he was in custody of the OklahomaDepartment of Corrections.� However, he did not file this petition under 28 US Code � 2254 until November 4, 2014, far outside of the one-year timelinefor making such application under federal law.
The United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma dismissed his appeal, citing the lack of timeliness in submitting his claim.
He then took his case to a higher court, asking the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver to grant a Certificate of Appealability (COA) to allow theappeal of the U.S. District Court's dismissal of his sentence modification request.
On Friday, the 10th Circuit Court cited Marsh v. Soares in denying his request for COA and dismissing his appeal, saying, "[I]t is well establishedthat ignorance of the law, even for an incarcerated pro se petitioner, generally does not excuse prompt filing.�
